And many other things. Most people will eat TONS of food over a lifetime and remain fairly stable- within about 10 pounds or so.

Calories in/calories out is amoot point completely when trying to figure out obesity. It is just an observation that when somebody loses MASS( fat OR muscle) there has to be an energy imbalance of some sort.

However, transplanting the gut flora from obese mice into thin , sterile germ free mice induces obesity WITH NO CHANGE WHATSOEVER in food intake or activity.

Guess who was pimping low carb diets for superior fat loss ADMANTLY AND FERVENTLY back in 2003, AFTER he experimented EXTENSIVELY with high carb in the 90s and fervently rejected high carb? Going out of his way to say how terrible high carb made him feel and how GREAT low carb was for his own energy and his clients energy?

OOOOPS! Dr. Michael Eades for the win! Self defeated by his OWN writings circa 2003. Where is mine and Dr. Eades $ 20,000 ?

Complete reversals are common for Internet scammers. This is a different situation than somebody HONESTLY learning new information. .: Don;t be naieve enough to believe that for a second. He repeatedly said high carb made him feel terribly bad- and strongly recommended aginst it for HEART HEALTH and WEIGHT loss.

The money dried up and he switched to high carb. Same story but word reversals for high and low………”

Seems like he’s got a personal grudge against you man. Now, correct me if I’m wrong, but you’re on the record as saying your previous high carb diet was composed of a lot of grains and processed food and that was the reason why you were feeling like shit on it right? Why is he posting this on Rich’s blog instead of confronting you directly with it?

My website has picked up a lot of new readers since that article was written, so here’s a quick recap: “Razwell” is an anonymous troll who pollutes every diet, health and even MMA blog and forum he can access. In addition, he sends vulgar and highly abusive emails to those who have incurred his wrath, often several times a day. I know, because I’ve been on the receiving end of his harassment.

Like most Internet trolls, Razwell is a complete and utter coward. He hides behind anonymous screen names and has never posted so much as a picture of himself.

In contrast to his current seething hatred of moi, “Razwell” was once a fanatical groupie of both yours truly and Uffe Ravnskov (author of The Cholesterol Myths). This terribly misguided joker would troll every diet and health website he could, rabidly expressing his demented man-crushes for Uffe and I in ALL-CAPS. His behaviour was, to be quite honest, a bloody embarrassment. So much so that at one point I even emailed him and suggested he tone down his persistent YELLING.

That’s right, folks, “Razwell” wasn’t always a Colpo-hater – quite the opposite. Here’s but a few of the countless choice quotes from the super-troll himself:

Obviously, “Razwell” no longer thinks of me in such glowing terms. What happened? Did he discover some key piece of contradictory evidence that I’d been deliberately hiding from people?

Nope. One day I failed to respond to an email of his within 12 hours, so he went off his bloody tree. If you think I’m yanking your chain, that no-one could possibly be launched into a deranged one man campaign of unbridled hatred against yours truly for such a trifling reason, then you know little about the deranged nature of the committed internet troll. I got an advanced education on this very subject when, in May 2008, I intervened in a dispute “Razwell” was having with author and MMA trainer Jamie Hale. Jamie was having problems at his Internet forum with an especially persistent and abusive web troll, and from his description it didn’t take long for me to work out who the culprit was.

I emailed “Razwell” (who at the time was masquerading as a “Chris Downey”) and, as anybody who ever naively attempted to intervene in a dispute between others won’t be surprised to learn, things quickly turned to scheisen.

The correspondence between “Razwell” and moi is reprinted below, in its unedited entirety:

===

Hey Chris

A Colpo to Chris

5/26/08

Hi Chris,

hope all is well,

I heard from Jamie Hale, apparently you guys seems to be having some sort of disagreement and he seems to think you have been submitting hate-posts on his forum.

I’m not sure what the deal is and I hate to butt in, but I would hate to see 2 people who have both been very kind with their support for me at war with each other.

Jamie is definitely one of the good guys, he thinks along the same lines as us, and I think it would be a shame for there to be a conflict between you two when there are a lot of other genuine jerks out there far more deserving of negative sentiment.

As for Codeslinger, he spends a lot of time overseas because of his job, I know for a fact right now is he in a war torn part of the world and answering web posts is the least of his concerns, so don’t be slighted if he never responded to you, some of my emails to him have gone unanswered but no big deal, I’ve eventually got in touch with him.

Take care, keep training,

Anthony.

==

Hi Anthony

Chris Downey to me

5/27/08

Hi Anthony

I hope you’re doing well too. I consider you a great guy and a friend.

I understand about Codeslinger, I definitely didn’t know that. I hope he is OK and stays safe. Had absolutely no idea.

As far as Jamie, I guess he and I got off on the wrong foot. This is what happened. I was very polite to him , told him his site was good and asked a general type question about 2 months ago . I didn’t understand why he would ignore it when he logged on many times answering other more specific questions soon after , with my question still in full view. I asked him several times, and I would have understood if he didn’t want to divulgve a workout or something. Or if he just said “I dont know “.

So I posed as “Dr. Susan Harmony PhD. ” as a joke. I copied word for word a guy named “Dr. Wot” on yahoo answers, as his/her views on fat burning . I was surprised to see my comments on his site. I thought he would see it for the trolling it was. I still do find it funny that he took it seriously as a real Dr. debating him and was so surprised when I saw it I had to laugh out loud. It seems to have generated huge reading on different sites with many thinking she was real

I’ll reconsider my views on Jamie , Anthony . because I value your thoughts and you have had much more interactions with him than me . I guess Jamie and I just got off on the wrong foot and I didn’t know him as a person.

I won’t do my Razwell type silly stuff on him anymore.because of my reconsideration of him and my respect for you. .

I like doing your workout, Anthony – it’s working well for me .and I appreciate it

Take Care , Anthony

Chris

==

Jamie Hale, My Views

Chris Downey to me

5/27/08

Hi Anthony

I just wanted to give yu a more detalied assesment of a reply other than the general one yesterday..

In the same way you felt Michael Eades was a real dick to you (which he was) , I feel the same way about Jamie Hale

Codeslinger is a completely different situation, I understand him.

But Jamie Hale was treated very respectfully by me initially. And also several times after. What got me was, I complimented his site genuinely and asked him a question on a thread that he started . He ignored it blatantly, while answering several threads below my question. I asked him about 3 times all ignored while others were being answered- all below my question – plus I said l liked his site genuinely . He could have at least told me he didn’t want to divulge something or he just honestly did not know.- I would have accepted that gladly.

I did the “Dr. Susan Harmony PhD” thing to get to him but as a joke too. I reconsidered it and told him it was just a troll.- it was obvious to most I was just trolling and it was a made up character . Some of things I said to him in e-mails trolling are not completely my words

I know you are not getting involved , Anthony, and just being a mediator, but until Jamie Hale acknowledges he was beyond rude to me for no reason at all , then I can’t ever like him. I’ll always view him as “dicky”

He’s not my number one enemy or anything, I have had people do far worse than that in regular life – not even close. And even on the internet people have done worse. I just don’t understand why he did that though. I never did anything to him and if he had clicked on my name he would have seen I am just as active at spreading the message as he supposedly is. I would say I am even more.

I don’t wish Jamie Hale anything bad , I just view him as being very “dicky”. with me for no good reason. When I personal messaged him , he was very sarcastic with me . I hope you can understand why I would feel this way about him based on his actions

But I know you are not trying to get involved Anthony nor am I trying to get you involved.

As far as working out – When I was really sick I was down to 130 pounds at a height of near 6″2″, so I built myself back up but over 3 years. I was on Dilaudid for pain etc in the hospital . It was beyond bad.

Currenty I can do about 140- 135 lbs standing military press (using no legs at all) for 5 -7 reps. The 45’s on each side. A really great day is 7. A worse day is 4-5 . I hope that’s good.

I ‘m not as experienced as you Anthony in lifting but I’m fairly OK in experience. I lifted in 96, 97, 98 but did not lift again until 2003 due to illness , and then with no real consistecny until around early 2006. I like your workout. But even now even doing my guitar job can be hard.

My brother on the other hand was really strong. He used to do 410 in the deadlift at the end of his workout for 5 sets of 6 at a bodyweight of 175 and at athe younfg age of 20 . This was back in 1996.

We met Magnus Ver Magnusson and Jesse Marunde face to face a few years ago at a Strongman expo in In Essington.PA. You can still see pics of it on google. Marunde was a super nice guy. We went up to him twice and he talked to us a long time. He even private messaged me on Christmas Day 2005 which I didn’t expect. (i pm’d him a few days earlier and thought if he got back it would be on another day) I can personally vouch that Jesse Marunde was a nice individual . I’m sure over time though he would have not remembered me and my brother talking with him . He meets so many people at these things . I feel bad for him his family and his close friends

And if he truly did not use steroids, like the toxicology wrie up said, I give him the tile of WSM winner because Mariusz has to use drugs.Do a youtube search of Jesse Marunde , Anthony. You’ll see some of his feats.

I was really sad to hear of what happened to him. He was a good man as are you .

I definitely won’t do any Razwell stuff to Jamie Hale on your forum out of respect for you. And on other forums I’ll take the high road with him. The Razwell stuff is just silly stuff I created back on FA.com – If you type “Oldman vs Razwell ” or ” Trolls throhgout the ages” into google , you’ll see the hilarious cartoons “oldman” drew “to get me back.” it truly is hilarious They even super imposed Morgan Freeman in one of them. (I like Morgan Freeman I just use him paired with the Maasai and Bruce Lee because it ‘s beyond ridiculous)

Take Care , Anthony

Chris

===

Hale Hasn’t Done SHIT, Plus He Is An Arrogant Naploean Complex Douche

Chris Downey to me

5/28/08

No reply, Anthony? When I wrote something early in the morning to get you an answer, and took at least 20 minutes?

The FACTS are Jamie Hale was far more rude to me than Michael Eades was to you. You wrote over 20 pages worth of vitriol over that. I defended you. But you can’t stick you for me? WHERE was Jamie Hale when you closed the Omonivore and needed support for yuour book in June 2006??????

ALL Jamie Hale does is PROMOTE He has NOT done shit compared to me, I have handed out flyers, spent many , many hours on the internet. He HASN’T dome all of this PLUS heUSES YOUR SITE TO PROMOTE. He PROMOTES and PROMOTES NONSENSE

His book should be calld NO Knowledge and NONSENSE by Jamie Hale Hale hs NOT done SHIT compared to me and yu KNOW it He is an ARROGANT douche with a napolean complex

You are OBVIOUSLY siding with your butt buddy Jamie the douche Hale

I’ll NEVER write another thing mentioning you , ONLY Dr Ravnskov or better yet Dr Malcolm Kendrick ‘s The Great Cholesterol Con written by A MEDICAL DOCTOR something Jamie Hale and you are NOT

YOu ARE a USER , who does not honor your MOST faithful supporters who were there at the worst of times

Only Anthony Colpo has the right to type things defending himself . Only Anthony Colpo is correct and his followers must then turn on that person . You have nerve with all the length of things you have typed with NO REASON as in Eades OR Hahn. Hahn had a point, Eades had a point. Dr Eades was correct about you . FRED HAHN WAS RIGHT TOO. I am NOT yours or anyone elses subservient asshole

And for the record Olympic sprinter’s do NOT do HIIT

You can that scammer Hale that

They WAIT 15 MINUTES BETWEEN SPRINTS

P.S. I’ll put MY LIFTS and especially my brother’s lifts against EITHER one of you . He deadlifts 410 6 times 5 sets at an age of 20 in 1996 NEITHER of you pooftahs could do that at that age or now.

===

A Colpo to Chris

5/28/08

Holy Cow Chris…you really need to take a chill pill.

Right now, it’s 9pm in Victoria…I did check my emails this morning around 10 am, and read your email, making a note to reply afterwards, as I often do.

So there has been a delay of not even 12 hours in answering your email, and this is how you behave? And then you wonder why you have energy and health issues?

For the record Chris, I am not siding with anyone. I still haven’t got around to replying to Jamie…but he hasn’t felt it necessary to send me a psychotic email telling me I am a horrible evil “user”.

However, you go ahead and believe whatever you want. If you believe that I am a horrible evil “user” because I don’t instantaneously reply to every email I get – even when I have been quite prompt and generous in my previous responses to you – then good for you.

Have a nice life,

Anthony.

===

That’s False

Chris Downey to me

5/28/08

First it WASN’T a psychotic e-mail I think that title belongs to you on your attack on Eades. I YTYPE IN CAPS and bold – it is MY STYLE

I am NOT a bad guy. But yes I AM PISSED. I have dome much . Sure you have gotten back to me many times rather fast Anthony , but this time and many others no response. Like that Jordan video I sent

Second Jamie Hale is an arrogant douche with false info

Sprinters do NOT do HIIT. They wait a good 15 minutes in between sprints. I KNOW a man in is almost 80 who runs `100 meters in 18 seconds THIS COUNTS for something

Empirical tyope evidence and real world experience matter MOST

Lyle McDonald exposes Hale’s crap

Have a nice life WITHOUT anymore plugs

Chris

===

A Colpo to Chris

5/28/08

Chris,

you really need help. I’m not writing that to be a smart ass or antagonize you…you seriously need some sort of qualified help working through your obviously deep seated emotional/psychological issues.

Acting like a serial pest that posts non-stop in ALL-CAPS all over the internet, turning rabidly angry and hounding people just because they fail to answer your web posts, posing on the internet as a female doctor…and telling someone they’re you’re “friend” and a “great guy” then not even 12 hours later unleashing a barrage of vitriol towards them, calling them a “pooftah” and a “user” all because they didn’t instantly reply to your most recent email!!…mate, that is not healthy balanced behavior. It’s downright fucking loopy.

Chris, I wish you all the best in resolving both your psychiatric and physical health issues, but please don’t email me any more – if you do, I suggest you don’t spend too much time writing up the email because I will be adding your email address to my blocked sender list. Any other emails you post with an alternative address will be instantly deleted. I just don’t have the time for this kind of nonsense.

Anthony.

==

After the above exchange, “Razwell” continued with a flurry of extremely virulent and abusive emails, which were received on a daily basis and all of which went unanswered. Most of them weren’t even opened; Gmail’s inbox set-up allows you to read not just the subject but the first line of an email before opening it, and it wasn’t exactly a challenge to work out who his emails were from.

The emails became less and less frequent and actually completely stopped for a while. However, every now and then I still get an email from this poor joker that I simply send straight to my archive without reading (I used to either delete them or tag them as spam, but I now archive them should I decide to one day pursue legal action against this nut).

Let’s now return to “Razwell’s” definition of a scammer. He writes:

“Complete reversals are common for Internet scammers. This is a different situation than somebody HONESTLY learning new information.”

So by his own definition, “Razwell” is unquestionably a scammer. His hatred and persistent defamation of yours truly is based, not on scientific grounds, but on the fact that I hadn’t replied to his email within half a day and that he believes this small delay somehow constituted a betrayal of him in favour of Jamie Hale.

One minute he was agreeing I was right and Eades was wrong, a day later he was championing the hapless low-carb ‘guru’ – not because of anything even remotely to do with science, but because of what he perceived in his twisted little mind to be a personal slight.

So not only is “Razwell” a childish little sook, he’s a shameless liar.

Further illustration of this comes from his claim:

“He repeatedly said high carb made him feel terribly bad- and strongly recommended aginst it for HEART HEALTH and WEIGHT loss. The money dried up and he switched to high carb. Same story but word reversals for high and low………”

This is a classic example of pure libel. Razwell is accusing me of changing the carbohydrate content of my diet purely for monetary reward. He makes this claim without any evidence whatsoever. Better be careful “Razwell”, the USA is only a 14-hour plain flight away and I’m starting to warm to the idea of unleashing a lawyer on your ass. It’s getting a little rich for my liking to have a blatant liar repeatedly call me a scammer. And if I do, your identity will finally be revealed to the world; I’m sure there are a lot of folks out there who’d just love to know who you are and where you reside…

Secondly, I have outlined ad nauseum my reasons for discarding my original high-carb diet, then abandoning the low-carb phase that followed it. “Razwell” is well aware of these reasons, given his masochistic bent for reading everything I write then working himself up into a mouth-frothing frenzy. Here’s what I wrote not so long ago (about halfway down the page here…if you can make it past the Sara Varone video LOL):

“I’ve never been much of a sweet tooth or junk eater, but when I went low-carb and cut the carbohydrates I also cut my intake of those troublesome whole grains and legumes. And presto, I began feeling much better. But like many low-carbers/vegetarians/vegans/followers of other screwball diets, my new eating regimen’s pitfalls eventually began to overwrite its initial benefits. Thankfully, my inquisitive and analytical nature led me to research why. Unfortunately, many people do the opposite – they simply go into denial and refuse to believe the ‘awesome’ diet that initially bought them benefits could in fact be the cause of their problems.

Oh yes it can. While blood sugar swings and the effects of dubious additives can be reversed rather quickly by a new diet, any nutritional deficiencies caused or aggravated by that same diet may take a lot longer to manifest themselves. But when they do, rest assured they can cause you a whole world of grief.

Thankfully, I eventually snapped out of my carbphobic stupor and now know there is absolutely nothing inherently harmful about carbohydrates. To the contrary, they are an athlete’s best friend. I actually eat a similar carb intake as I did in my whole grain days, but suffer none of the lethargy, digestive difficulties, or other health issues associated with that diet. The major differences that I have pinpointed are a higher fat intake, higher long chain omega-3 intake, and avoidance of all whole grain and legume products. I eat white rice and products with white flour (every 3-4 days, I rotate their intake as I do with just about everything I eat) and have noticed no discernible ill effect. As for legumes, I have consumed them on a couple of occasions in the last couple of years just to see what would happen…and they made me feel rotten, even in relatively small amounts. So the major material differences between my diet now and then are a higher overall fat intake (approximately 30% of calories compared to less than 10% during my fat-phobic days), greater intake of essential fatty acids and a far lower intake of anti-nutrients.”

My old high-carb diet was replete with ‘healthy’ junk I wouldn’t touch these days, including wholemeal breads, wholemeal pastas, rye breads, brown rice and legumes. Nowadays, I eat even more carbs, but no anti-nutrient laden whole-grain or wholemeal products, no rye, far less wheat, and no legumes. I get my carbs instead from sweet potatoes, white rice, potatoes, fruits and berries, taro, and occasional servings of white bread/rolls/pizza.

I’ve also lost the fatphobia I suffered during my first attempt at high-carbing, and have a much more thorough nutrient supplementation regimen in place nowadays.

I am not in any way embarrassed by my discarding of the low-carb paradigm. Quite the opposite; when you delve into the science and realize something is a load of bollocks, changing your stance is the only sensible and rational thing to do. I’ll be buggered if I’m going to follow the lead of folks like Jimmy Moore and Michael Eades and mindlessly cling to a paradigm that has clearly failed to live up to its scientifically untenable hype. As it turns out, I was ahead of my time; what I did in 2008 by dumping low-carb is what more and more folks are starting to do en masse in 2012.The fact that my findings and personal experiences are now being emulated and validated by others, including some rather high-profile and formerly staunch supporters of low-carbing, obviously infuriates Colpo-haters like “Razwell” to no end.

Suck it up, Sunshine.

So I guess I’ll be keeping my $20,000. It’s been several years since I made the twenty-grand challenge to Eades et al to present a ward study showing greater fat-derived weight loss on isocaloric low-carb diets, and the best the high priest of MAD could do was to make a shonky attempt at buying my silence with a fallacious offer of a hook-up with a literary agent in order to secure a deal for The Great Cholesterol Con and also The Fat Loss Bible – the latter being the very book he has gone to extreme lengths to try and discredit.

Those low-carbers sure aren’t the sharpest tools in the box…

But hey, if “Razwell” really thinks I owe him twenty grand, then the anonymous, racist little coward is more than welcome to attempt to make his case to me. In person.

As for that article from almost 10 years ago that “Razwell” dredged up from the murky depths of the Internet, the sentiments it expresses regarding low-carb diets could not be further from what I know now. I was rather disappointed to find this article, which clearly does not accurately reflect my current thoughts on low-carb diets, still floating around in cyberspace. There were no email or any other contact details available on that site, so I dug up the WHOIS details for the lowcarb.com.au website and sent the following email to the owner, a Ms Leigh Cook:

===

(Sent 8.35am, March 6, 2012)

Subject: Article removal request

Hi Leigh,

I was recently made aware that your website (lowcarb.com.au) is still running an article authored by myself way back in 2003 titled “Common Myths About Low Carbohydrate Diets”:

Some nine years and literally hundreds of studies later, I cannot emphasize strongly enough that I no longer agree with the bulk of the sentiments expressed in that article.

My stance on saturated fat and cholesterol remains unchanged, and has been further bolstered by evidence published since 2003. Several meta-analyses, for example, including one published under the auspices of the World Health Organization, have concluded there is no evidence supporting any causative link between saturated fat and heart disease.

However, the exact opposite has occurred with low-carb diets, especially those of the ketogenic variety. As I began studying them with the same intense focus I had employed in my research on cholesterol and fats, and as a wealth of new research appeared subsequent to 2003, I had no other choice but to conclude most of the claims being made for low-carb diets were unscientific nonsense.

Here’s a brief rundown of why:

Weight loss: After digging up every metabolic ward study I could find where, unlike free-living studies, the caloric intake of the low- and high-carb participants was tightly controlled, it became readily apparent that isocaloric low-carbohydrate diets offer absolutely no fat-derived weight loss advantage whatsoever. This is discussed at great length in my book The Fat Loss Bible, of which I’d be happy to send you a complimentary copy.

Bone density: While high-protein intakes per se have not been shown to promote bone loss and may in fact enhance bone density when consumed as part of moderate- to high-carbohydrate diets[1], ketogenic low-carb diets may be an entirely different story.

When Reddy et al switched ten healthy subjects from their usual diet to the Atkins diet for 6 weeks, urine acidity and calcium excretion markedly increased. The increase in urinary calcium levels was not compensated by a commensurate increase in intestinal calcium absorption. Serum osteocalcin (a protein found in bone and important for the growth of bones and teeth) decreased significantly. The Atkins diet also significantly decreased urinary citrate, an inhibitor of calcium stone formation. The researchers concluded a very-low-carbohydrate diet “delivers a marked acid load to the kidney, increases the risk for stone formation, decreases estimated calcium balance, and may increase the risk for bone loss.”[2]

The Inuit Eskimo, who are frequently cited as a shining example of the long-term safety of low-carb diets, in fact suffered an earlier and more intense onset of age-related bone loss than white Americans, despite their physically active lifestyle[3].

Accelerated mineral excretion and accompanying cardiovascular complications: The accelerated sodium and potassium excretion seen on very low-carbohydrate diets has also been shown to disturb blood pressure regulation sufficient to cause postural hypotension[4]. In at least one instance, this appears to have resulted in a fatal outcome; a 2002 case report in the Southern Medical Journal reported the death of 16-year-old Rachel Huskey from Sturgeon, Missouri, who suffered a fatal cardiac arrest after commencing a ketogenic diet comprised of meat, cheese, and salads [5]. Post-mortem examination found no evidence of underlying cardiovascular disease and the toxicological report was normal, ruling out drug use. What examiners did observe was ventricular fibrillation accompanied by extremely low serum potassium and calcium levels, and possibly low magnesium levels (serum magnesium was not directly measured but can accompany low potassium levels). These findings were similar to those reported for the very low-fat and ketogenic liquid protein diets that caused a spate of deaths in the 1960s and 70s, in which low serum potassium levels were commonly noted; low magnesium and calcium levels were also reported in some of the victims[6]. Sudden cardiac death associated with deficiency of the important trace element selenium has also been noted in epileptic children following ketogenic diets[7,8].

The May 2006 issue of the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition reported a six-week clinical trial comparing the weight loss and metabolic effects of a ketogenic diet with a non-ketogenic diet (33 versus 157 grams of carbohydrate daily, respectively). Prior to the study, all participants were screened to exclude those with diagnosed diseases. Despite this, a male subject following the ketogenic diet developed heart arrhythmias during the first week and had to be dropped from the study[9].

Further testimony to the problems caused by the excessive mineral excretion inherent in ketogenic diets was provided by a New York Times writer, who after only three days on the initial ketogenic phase of Drs. Michael and Mary Dan Eades’ Protein Power began feeling “quite ill — dizzy, and with a pounding heart”[10]. That her situation was remedied only with “lots of beef broth and potassium pills” clearlyillustrates the terribly poor nutritional quality of ketogenic diets. Potassium, after all, is abundant in the food supply and anyone eating a mixed diet containing fresh plant foods should have little trouble meeting their potassium needs.

Adverse psychological effects: A number of studies have also detected poorer cognitive and psychological outcomes on ketogenic low-carb diets[11-13]. This, despite the fact that the subjects who volunteered for the studies were considered ““healthy, obese, young to middle-aged adults with normal mood state…”

An insight into what can happen when someone with pre-existing psychological issues embarks on a ketogenic diet was provided by a 2006 case report published in the journal Psychosomatics. A forty-seven year-old obese woman with well-controlled panic disorder decided to go on the Atkins diet; the very next day, she began to experience “shakiness” which progressed to a fully-fledged panic attack later that day. She increased her medication dose in an attempt to control the symptoms, but continued to have frequent panic attacks. Over the next four weeks the patient experienced a marked increase in her baseline anxiety level. She eventually quit the diet and resumed eating carbohydrates. Her symptoms improved the very same day, and disappeared entirely after several days. According to the report, she continued to do well over the following years[14].

General side effects: Since the 2003 article was written, I’ve uncovered an alarming number of studies and case reports calling into question the safety of ketogenic diets. Ketogenic diets have repeatedly been shown to cause cramps, lethargy, bad breath, constipation[15,16], and menstrual irregularities [17,18].

Ketogenic diets have been employed with epileptic patients since the 1920s, and some low-carb devotees have cited this as ‘proof’ of their safety. However, adverse effects have been widely reported among epileptics following ketogenic diets, and include cardiomyopathy, dehydration, nausea/vomiting, bruising, diarrhea, constipation, gastritis, hyperuricemia, various infectious diseases, hypoglycemia (low blood sugar), hyponatremia, hepatitis, acute pancreatitis, persistent metabolic acidosis, osteopenia, kidney stones, and severe vitamin and mineral deficiencies[19-25]. In some instances these adverse effects have proven fatal. As one doctor commented in a 2005 journal article on ketogenic diets, “tolerability and complication-related issues are the rule, not the exception … medical surveillance must be maintained throughout the entire period of dietary treatment.”[26]

Adverse effects on thyroid hormone status: Carbohydrate restriction, to both ketogenic and non-ketogenic levels, has repeatedly been shown in controlled trials to impair the conversion of T4 into the all-important T3, a condition known as euthyroid sick syndrome. This condition can be marked by low energy levels and unusually poor tolerance to cold. I can attest to the discomfort caused by the latter symptom, having experienced it first hand on a low-carb diet, along with its subsequent prompt alleviation upon commencement of a high-carb diet. Individuals with thyroid issues or poor cold tolerance should be very wary of low-carb diets. A comprehensive and fully referenced discussion of this topic can be found here:

For these reasons, I can no longer even begin to recommend ketogenic low-carb diets in good conscience, and in fact have included lengthy discussions of their pitfalls in both of my books, The Great Cholesterol Con and The Fat Loss Bible, both of which are far more up to date summaries of my findings than the “Common Myths” article appearing on your site.

When it comes to matters pertaining to diet and health, I think you’ll agree we have an obligation to present our readers with the most accurate and up-to-date information. For the reasons I stated above, the aforementioned article no longer meets these standards, and I urge you to remove it at your earliest convenience. I note the website still features a number of other articles authored by myself on low-carb diets; again, I kindly request you remove any and all such articles as they are no longer indicative of my sentiment towards low-carb diets and any impression garnered by your readers to the contrary would be a highly misleading one.

Kind regards,

Anthony Colpo.

(References below)

===

So there you go, folks. Unlike certain other dogmatic fanatics who will never admit they’re wrong and who will cling to the dying low-carb paradigm in Titanic-like fashion, I’m not too proud to admit I was wrong back in 2003. At the time I was preoccupied with researching the cholesterol sham, and had yet to scour through the mountain of carbohydrate- and calorie-related literature. When I did so, it quickly became apparent that virtually all the cherished tenets of the low-carb movement were utter bollocks.

“A little candor never leaves me. It is what protects me.”
Antonio Porchia

Oh, and one more thing I would like to say before I sign off: Congratulations, ”Razwell”, for drawing further negative attention with your latest outburst to the pitfalls of ketogenic diets, such as those recommended by the late Dr. Atkins and in Eades’ Protein Power. I’m sure Dr Michael Eades and the rest of your low-carb cohorts will be very proud of you.